God Upholds All Things

A human mechanic may leave the machine he has constructed to work without his further personal superintendent, because, when he leaves it, God’s laws take it up; and, by their aid, the materials of which the machine is made retain their solidity—the steel continues to be elastic, the vapor keeps its expansive power.

But, when God has constructed his machine of the universe, he cannot so leave it, or any the minutest part of it, in its immensity and intricacy of movement, to itself; for, if he retires, there is no second God to take care of this machine. Not from a single atom of matter can He for a moment withdraw his superintendent and support. Each successive moment, all over the world, the act of creation must be repeated. The existence of the world witnesses to a perpetuity of creating influence. Active omnipotence must flood the universe, or its machinery stops, and its very existence terminates.

The signs of an all-pervading supernatural energy meet us wherever we turn. Every leaf waves in it, every plant in all its organic processes lives in it; it rolls round the clouds, else they would not move; it fires the sunbeam, else it would not shine; and there is not a wave that restlessly rises and sinks, nor a whisper of the wanton wind that “bloweth where it listeth,” but bespeaks the immediate intervention of God.